At Vittoria, too, Buonaparte's carriage was captured with some ladies in it. The French army had retreated to Pampeluna, so Lord Wellington sent a sergeant and twelve men under a flag of truce to escort these ladies into the French camp at that place, in return for which Buonaparte behaved very well, for he gave the sergeant a doubloon and each of the men one-half of that sum, and had them escorted out of his lines by a French officer.
Our army meanwhile pursued the enemy until night put an end to our proceedings, when we encamped two or three miles west of Vittoria, there remaining two nights and one day busily engaged on the forage for ourselves. Happily thousands of sheep were found, that the enemy had been obliged to abandon on their retreat. I had been fortunate enough to get one and bring it into camp, and was proceeding to kill it by putting my bayonet through the neck, when Lieutenant Kelly of our company happening to pass, "Hullo, Lawrence," he said, "you seem a capital butcher." I said, "Would you like a piece of it?" "I certainly should very much," he answered, "for I am devilish hungry;" so I took out my knife and cut off one of the quarters just as it was, without even skinning it, and gave it to him, saying, "There, sir, you must skin it yourself." He thanked me and said, "Never mind the skin, I will manage that."
Not only myself, but several of my comrades had likewise managed to get a share of these sheep, so that night a general cooking ceremony commenced: our first movement being to go round and gather all the odd sticks we could lay our hands upon, including gates, doors, chairs, tables, even some of the window-frames being knocked out of the many deserted houses and gathered together in one heap for this great purpose; and in a very short time both roast and boiled mutton were seen cutting about in all directions. Nor had we altogether forgotten our former experience of the beans which were growing plentifully at that time and place, and we found that night's meal as good a one as we had tasted for some weeks past. After it was over we lay down for the night,--a body picket having previously been sent out to guard against any surprise from the enemy; but we lay very comfortable without being disturbed the whole night, and as our fires did not cease burning we kept very warm as well.